


Not A Love Story

by cordeliadelayne



Category: Spooks | MI-5
Genre: F/M, Light Angst, One Night Stands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-19
Updated: 2016-10-19
Packaged: 2018-08-23 07:34:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8319322
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cordeliadelayne/pseuds/cordeliadelayne
Summary: Ruth finds working on the Grid is tougher than she expected.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dweomeroflight](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=dweomeroflight).



> Written for dweomeroflight, who gave the prompt, “One day soon I'm gonna tell the moon about the crying game...“ Set early-ish in series 2.
> 
> Originally posted to Livejournal in 2011.

Ruth was in the toilets when Tom found her. She was sitting on the toilet seat in the stall furthest from the door, her hair all over the place and her nose red from crying.

“Oh god, sorry,” she said, wiping ineffectually at her face.

Tom stared at her unblinkingly. It wasn't a judgemental kind of stare though, so Ruth felt able to pull herself together.

“It's not just about today, is it?” Tom asked, when he'd judged that Ruth was sufficiently herself again.

Ruth shook her head and shrugged at the same time. “No. I suppose not.” She looked around at the toilet stall. “This isn't how I imagined any of this going.”

“This?”

“My life,” Ruth said. She looked down at her hands and jerked as she realised she was systematically tearing the toilet roll to pieces.

Tom leaned against the doorway, saying nothing.

“Does it get easier? The lying?”

“Yes,” Tom said.

Ruth looked up at him and saw his lips twitch, just. “Liar,” she said with a watery smile.

Tom gave her a real smile then, if only briefly.

The main door opened and one of the admin came in, took one look at Tom and then turned right around again.

“It must be nice,” Ruth said, “having that effect on people”.

She got up and straightened her skirt, scattering bits of toilet roll on to the floor.

“The cleaners will get that,” Tom said. Ruth nodded – she'd just been thinking about getting a dust pan and brush herself.

“Do you need to go home?” Tom asked.

Ruth looked at her reflection in the mirror over Tom's shoulder. If she went out now everybody would now that she'd been crying, but if she went home, they'd know she couldn't hack it on the Grid.

“No, I'm okay to stay,” Ruth said.

Tom patted her on the shoulder as he went by her. As he reached the door, Zoe stuck her head in.

“I brought concealer,” she said, cheerfully holding up the emergency make-up bag she kept in her bottom drawer.

Ruth smiled and nodded gratefully at her.

“Well, I'll leave you girls to it, then,” Tom said. He slipped out of the bathroom with a grateful nod at Zoe.

* * * * * *

Ruth kept her head down the next few days and everyone easily fell into their practised routine of ignoring her little breakdown. They'd all been there, done that. Harry told Tom to keep an eye on her and Tom had agreed.

Of course Ruth had fallen into the usual trap of hero worshipping him. He'd seen it before, and sometimes he even encouraged it, but in this case he didn't want Ruth to get too over attached. She needed to see that they were all human and that they made mistakes just like anyone else.

But after one case after another where Tom's own belief in the Service was chipped away at, he started taking comfort in Ruth's gentle optimism. She tried to see the good in everyone and he could respect that, even if he couldn’t follow her lead.

It started with Ruth making him the perfect cup of coffee without him telling her how he liked it. It carried on with her speaking up for herself more and more, with a clear grasp of the facts and an unnerving ability to fit all the pieces together. She might not always read people that well, but there was no one on the Grid quite as good at pulling up all the information they needed before they even knew they needed it.

“She's good, isn't she?” Zoe said one day, perching on Tom's desk. He looked up to find Danny flirting outrageously with Ruth, who was taking his attention far better than he suspected she would have done a few months ago.

“Yes,” Tom agreed. Her turned back to the report he was reading. “Harry seems pleased with her.”

“Not just Harry,” Zoe said, in a significant enough way that Tom knew not to look up. Zoe just hummed under her breath and went to drag Danny out to the pub. Ruth was asked to join them, but she declined as they all knew she would.

“Is there anything you need?” Ruth asked. She was standing in front of Tom's desk and Tom blinked – he hadn't heard her approach.

“No, thank you,” he said, unaccountably nervous. “You head on home. I won't be much longer.”

Ruth hovered for a few seconds before slinking off.

Tom sat perfectly still and decided that no matter how many times he read Zoe's report, it still wasn’t going to make any sense. He put it on his to-read pile and started to pack his things away. He'd just have to pick up where he left off the next day.

When Tom went out into the parking garage he found Ruth staring in to the back of her car.

“Flat tyre,” she explained when Tom came over to investigate.

“And no spare?”

“No,” Ruth winced. “It's on my list of things to get done but...I'll just get the bus. I'll be fine.”

“I'll give you a lift,” Tom decided. “Come on.”

Tom didn't really give Ruth the opportunity to argue and after locking up her car she obediently followed.

“Isn't this dreadfully out of your way?” she asked.

“Not dreadfully,” Tom replied. Ruth smiled at him, with a small, confused pucker of her brow. He got the feeling she never quite knew what to expect of him, but then he often found himself thinking the same thing of her.

It was inevitable that Ruth would invite him in. And equally inevitable that they never touched the offered coffee but headed towards the bedroom instead.

Tom found it a pleasant enough distraction and he was fairly certain Ruth did as well. She certainly wasn't surprised when he got up at midnight and started to dress.

“Will you manage to get to work in the morning?” he asked.

Ruth pulled up the covers so they bunched over her chest. “I'll be fine. Don't worry.”

“Lock the door after me,” Tom said. Then he retraced his steps from earlier, waiting by the door until Ruth came down the stairs in her large grey dressing gown.

“See you tomorrow,” Ruth said, with a hitch in her voice to indicate it was almost, but not quite, a question.

“See you tomorrow,” Tom said and then slipped out of the door. He didn’t head to his car until he heard Ruth lock it behind him.

* * * * * *

Life on the Grid went on as normal. He and Ruth got on as well as usual, and if anything their night together seemed to solidify the team as a whole. Extremists continued to threaten democracy. Lies tripped easily off their tongues, and sometimes it felt like they were cast adrift with no idea of the difference between right and wrong.

But Tom never caught Ruth crying again. He liked to think she'd just grown better at protecting herself, but maybe there were just no more tears left to be shed. Or perhaps she'd merely learned to hide the signs a lot better.

He hoped there was a good reason anyway. She deserved far better than a life dedicated to the Service. And she certainly didn't deserve any more tears.  



End file.
